


Enemy Mine

by orphan_account



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: AO3 wants to tag lark as freeform but this is just a lark in the dark, Captivity over Thangorodrim, Dark Premise, Gen, Sauron being a dick, Somewhat character studyish, general fuckery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-05
Updated: 2019-11-05
Packaged: 2021-01-23 18:37:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21324805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Hanging from the Thangorodrim, Maedhros is paid a most unwelcome visit by one of his hosts.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 11





	Enemy Mine

**Author's Note:**

> **A/N**: This is, in terms of situation, speculative but I wanted to explore it. This is my first time delving into anything other than LOTR, so...fair warning.

Cold...it was so cold.

Cold...and yet not...for the massive furnaces that fueled Morgoth’s forges threw forth unbearable heat. The smoke was cloying...choking; it invaded Maedhros’ lungs like ashen hands until he thought perhaps his insides were coated with char…’till perhaps the whole of him was a twisted...ruined thing hanging above the monstrosity that was Angband. If he hung long enough...maybe he would become one with the slag around him...naught but a rocky...suffocated memory...like so many before him. It was in moments like this...when his mind was not consumed by darkness… that Maedhros despaired the most. For surely none would come for him...surely it had been too long to turn to hope.

Not for the first time, he cursed his Oath.

He cursed it, and yet he hearkened to it...was driven mercilessly by words that he could not rescind once spoken. Maedhros had sworn to his sire that he would recover the Silmarils, and this was his lot. It was his folly to think to barter with the enemy...his own desperation that had driven him to such acts and he had none to blame but himself. None...for he had dragged not only himself but those he cared for into the depths of his father’s obsession. And what of jewels? Taking a shallow, sickly breath Maedhros gritted his teeth as the scent of ash nearly overcame him. He could not deny the beauty of the Silmarils...but the cost…

He was unsure if the cost was worth the gain.

But he had done as he swore...and now he hung...hung by one hand over the peaks of Thangorodrim. For weeks now it had been so, and while he did not begrudge his fate he despaired for his kin. And the Oath...the Oath raged within him. So close and yet so far from his goal he was tormented by his failings and by the darkness that surged around him. It was at once repellent and yet heady. In his broken state of mind...he could not ignore its inveiglement...could not ignore the way it settled in his soul and drove him to rage, to ruin, and to despair.

_’So broken...son of Fëanor.’_

Closing his eyes against the fire that threatened to burn his vision, Maedhros shivered as the voice invaded his mind...as the oily yet svelte tonalizations that addressed him sank their claws deep into his Fëa and _yanked_. His spirit shivered with revulsion...revulsion...and something else...something he did not want to and would not acknowledge. A laugh that was not a laugh...for nothing so merciless and so cruel...so calculating and measured could surely be compared to any form of levity. It echoed over the ruined waste of his mentality...slithered into the recesses of his consciousness until he felt swallowed by it.

Now and again.

Now and again he was seen to; and by _seen_ it was more of an oleaginous gloat. He knew not what Sauron gained by looking upon him...helpless as he was...atop the peaks. He supposed it was for naught but the enjoyment of his torment. Or perhaps to make sure that he remained in a state of listless resignation. Long ago had Maedhros known he would die there...that he would waste in his lingering state. His kin would not help him; not after his obsessive quest for that which brought nothing but grief and servitude. He supposed that Sauron drew something from his despair...that he must delight in it...one way or another.

_’Your grief is the sweetest of elixirs’_ was the purred accession, and again he forced himself to bite his tongue. He would not speak to it...he would not acknowledge it. This, too, he had learned from many past failures...to never bandy words with the Enemy for it would do naught but drive him further into the darkness. Yet it was impossible not to when the Maiar was privy to his thoughts...when he could sense his ponderings without him having to open his mouth. _’And yet sweeter is the torment which you bring upon yourself.’_

At this Maedhros’ eyes snapped open, but he was forced to flinch...to shrink away-as little as he was able in his current state-from the blinding light before him. Sauron was no less brilliant than the legends said; no less crowned in his glory and yet somehow still terrible to behold. Clothed in fire...veins flickering with the otherworldly essence simmering through his being...he was beyond mortal comprehension. Eyes as bright as furnaces yet swathed with an unfathomable...yawning darkness...hair nearly as blinding as the Silmarils themselves but suffused with a dark flame. Beautiful…_deadly_.

_’How far the mighty doth fall.’_

True...and yet somehow hypocritical. For Sauron had been privy to the opportunity of goodness and had rejected it in favor of his master. Often had Maedhros wondered why...but he knew better than to ask. Perhaps Sauron had fallen victim to the same dark flame that all of Morgoth’s host seemed to hold in thrall. Perhaps too, he was a servant...no better and yet somehow not less.

_’Aye, a servant’_ was the amused response in his mind, even as cruel...darkened lips curved into a smile wrought with blood...though there was none to be seen. _’A willing servant, however, not an enthralled one.’_ He must have sensed Maedhros’ disbelief...for suddenly he was too close...suddenly the brilliance before him was far too near and too hot. A hand touched his cheek and it was like a brand of molten iron pressed against his skin. The epidermis there sizzled, and it was only years of monstrous discipline that kept him from howling his agony to the blackened skies. _’Are you curious...little one?’_ The hand pressed harder and he knew it would scar...knew that his already-marred body was bound for yet more mutilation. _’Do you seek knowledge for which you have no answers? I can give them to you...but they may not be to your liking.’_

_No_ he wanted to cry out...but he was too proud to respond...too angry and too twisted with rage to admit defeat. The chuckle that bounced around his psyche this time was more terrible than the last. It relished his pain...drank from it as one drinks mead and the air around them grew thicker and hotter.

_’Very well’_ was the amused response, even as Sauron’s lips twisted in an expression of scorn. _’I will tell you, but dare you not twist my words to your liking in later years...dare you not make of me a small...pitiful thing such as yourself.’_ The pain was abruptly gone, and Maedhros blinked before acknowledging that the unbearable light was also gone. In its place was only Sauron in physical form; suspended through means he could fathom not...feet above the endless plunge that was forever his torment. Still, however, was he terrible to behold...for the body before him seemed but a shell to some abyssal void deep within. _’This is not mercy’_, was the falsely gentle response. _’I cannot have you so wrought with pain that you will not hear my words...and hear them you will.’_ The hand touching his cheek moved downwards; until it clutched his bicep...nails digging in until he could feel blood welling ‘round the fingertips. When his enemy spoke again...his voice was but a hiss. _’So _listen_, son of mine enemy...and perhaps in your ignorance...you will find knowledge with which you have, until now, gone without._

* * *

Carnality.

Such a little world and people shy from it. I know not why; save for perhaps they have allowed such a word to have power. And make no mistake, all words have power...but it is up to the speaker when it comes to how it is beheld. Long was I taught this; long did my Master teach this to me. Before the deep...velvet and all consuming darkness. Before the oily...vast and limitless night My Lord flung into the sky...like a blanket of noire. When the world was new my Master knelt before me, he knelt and still was taller than I...in his incorporeal form. I looked up to him...formless and yet formed with Creation in my soul and he told me that I must not let words bend my will. Rather, he instructed me to bend them to mine.

_'You are but small'_ he remarked, and there was no chastisement behind it. _'If you are to truly be of use, you will learn to curb your tongue.'_

He said this to me, Master mine, over the spread of the Deeps and the expanse of the air. Over an ocean I and my brethren had toiled to form...he came to me. Like the blackness of a thunderhead...so different from the Light of Manwë he came and drained the seas and said such things. I was confused, for I had said nothing to him...nothing of offense save for a greeting and his words gave me the impression that I had somehow slighted him. Outcast he was, ignored or lamented...like somehow the Ainur the others knew had passed long ago and without their notice.

The wayward son.

Or perhaps not so wayward, for everything that he destroyed he dismantled with the intention of making something new. Granted, that which he formed was frigidly cold or unbearably hot; mineral and fierce and somehow deeply primal. Melkor fascinated me...and perhaps he knew it, for it was I...of all of us...that he approached first. It was I who he spoke to and I who saw that there was more to him than destruction and decay. It was I...who saw that Melkor was more than the terror wrought in twisted things and bent proliferation.

...Or, perhaps, that is just what you want me to say...little one.

That is what you want of me...is it not? To say that I am misunderstood; to say that _we_ are misunderstood. It’s easier that way, hmm? To think that we are not of the darkness which we created, and perhaps we are not. But ‘twas Melkor who went looking for the Flame in the Void…’twas Melkor...apart from his brothers, who began to ask the questions that none others dared to ask...or perhaps that they did not think. ‘Twas my Lord who sewed the discord of his ponderings into the song of Manwë...not once, but thrice. ‘Twas also my Lord who then descended upon Arda...and then unwrought what was barely wrought.

And it was I who hearkened to him.

I did...I did hearken to him...for the chaos that came with every gesture was a thing made asynchronous and so I desired it. I desired the freedom to weave my own visions of creation...aside from those laid before us. As mortals slaver at their chronologically brief shackles to break free from societal confines of definition, as they rage against the machinations of society, so I slavered to be liberated from that which bound me. In Melkor I witnessed that vindication...that howling vortex of complex obliteration and rejuvenation. As the other Maiar bewailed his destruction of their works...so I nursed the deep satisfaction that out of such destruction would come something black and unrelenting...merciless...infernal and unforgivably cruel.

There was a time when I knew goodness.

Manwë’s goodness, of course...and what is goodness but the definitions with which we are given to define it? I was a loyal servant...once...I believed in his Song...once. There was a time when Melkor’s discord was abhorrent to me...when I could not understand his questions as I looked upon his discord with confusion and with disdain. Surely, I thought, there was no greater wrongness than to defy Creation. Surely Melkor would face retribution for his actions...and thus learn his place among us.

But he did not.

He did not...and as time went on I grew to acknowledge the beauty in every fractured, brilliant note he set before us only to be rejected. For in those notes were thoughts that none could fathom...not even Manwë, for he had not seen Darkness such as Melkor had. He did not understand the beauty of that which is unyielding...of that which burns and twists and crumbles under the iron fist of destruction. So too did his brothers reject him for they were shortsighted...obsessed with their own definitions of beauty and yet unwilling to hear of the things that he wished to create...for they were not aligned with the plan. And yet I saw it...I saw Him as he was and is and ever shall be and so I desired such limitlessness...such brutality.

Thusly, I was brought into the fold.

A seduction...some might call it ...but it was not. Merely an invitation, which I accepted. You are a King...are you not? You are familiar with invitations. So my Lord did invite me to his table, and so did I accept. And I am not so foolish as to desire to be equal to my Lord, I know my place, and I cherish it for it is all I could have asked for and more. One does not spurn the gifts they are given from those that are great...they do not desire to sit at the head of the table...for they know what it is to serve...and so I did. I did and we revelled in fire...in blood and ash and the destruction and remaking of all things. Cursed were we...by our former brothers...by our Maker and our brethren...but it mattered not, for we were free to do as we desired.

And what we desired was obliteration.

It is not easy...you see...to remake the world into what you wish it would be when there are those who want it otherwise. Manwë created the world with love...but we did not want love from our subjects...nor did we desire them to be beautiful or to live long. No, better that they were twisted and ruined...better that they were tormented and that we were feared because then there were none that would dare usurp us. A facsimile of affection we could provide...of course...a reason for loyalty...a means for our destruction...but that it is all. When you wish to rule the world you must inveigle your subjects...you must fill their heads with affections and questions and all manner of desires so they are distracted from the fact that they are pawns.

But you already know this...don’t you...son of Fëanor?

You flinch back from me...as if you do not know of what I speak...but are you not equally as guilty? Do you not lead your people on a relentless quest for my Master’s jewels because you have sworn an Oath you cannot break? Do you not allow them the illusion of victory, of battles won despite sacrifice...for one single…_selfish_ cause? Oh yes...you do little one. I have tasted the flesh of your kin...those who you allow to spill their blood on the battlefield for the sake of the vision of your sire. I have dined on the despair of those close to you, those who trust you and follow you into Doom because you have willed it so...because your father willed it.

We are not so very different...you and I.

Loyalty and love…you protest with such things when you could not possibly comprehend the greatness of servitude. That is why you gnaw at the bit of all things...that and because Melkor gave to you the desire to be apart...the desire to usurp. His melody sings within you whether you will it or not. Manwë did not put it there, _he_ did. That dark song in your soul is wrought from the hands of my Master...and myself. For I have had a good hand in his work...in the organizing of it, in the execution and the subtle, careful inveiglement of it. I have wrought fire and flame from your Fëa…’tis not of your own doing...such malice...but it _is_ you that feeds it.

I have served my Master well...and he knows it.

In the dark of our halls...when all but the two of us have gone...he rewards me for my fealty. Though I would not ask it of him, he gives to me his praise...his approval. In blackened courtyard and scattered...tumbled stones I share of him as he shares with no other. For my fire licks at his darkness like a thing consumed and so we are one...so we shall ever be. You do not understand this...little one.

* * *

_’You do not understand this…’_

It was telling, Maedhros reflected with dark humor, that Sauron should use ‘We’ so flagrantly. For it told him that despite his posturings, despite his grand gestures of disdain...Sauron held great admiration for Melkor. Enough that despite the fact that the Silmarils would surely drive him to madness, if they hadn’t already, the lesser Maiar would remain by his side. Moreover, despite their power, it didn’t seem as if he was given to their sway...something else held him in thrall. That was not fealty, the son of Fëanor acknowledged with a surge of black mirth...that was love. Sauron _loved_ Melkor.

He bit back a cry as a hand was slapped over his mouth, as the nails attached to it bit into his cheeks.

_’Don’t **patronise** me!’_ was the snarled retort. _’You have no knowledge here, elf. You comprehend **nothing**!_

“I understand goodness” Maedhros croaked, unable to keep quiet any longer. “And I understand love. You and I are alike, you say. So do I understand that love can drive one to make unbreakable oaths...that it can blind you to your true purpose.” He laughed, and it was grating, wet thing...borne from the dregs of bitterness. “You’re just as much of a slave as I am, worm.”

For a moment...it seemed as if something in the Maiar before him wavered. There was the sense of all-consuming...looming darkness. It choked him...threatened to bury itself under his skin and grind him to dust. Then, just as abruptly as it had arrived...it was gone. In its place was a kind of mocking silence.

_’Mayhap you wish it was so simple’_ was the sneered retort...smooth as glass, slick as lantern oil. _’But only because you are lesser than I...and so you can only see so far. And because you wish for the uncertainty...that **’maybe’** to assuage your actions, your reasonings against those greater than you...because it is easier than obedience. Because you are a weak...useless thing. Weak, useless things desire freedom against divinity.’_ A grin and it was all teeth...impossibly wide and sharp in a sudden moment...monstrous and morphing and stretched to proportions a normal mouth would never have been able to accomplish. _’You wish it so because then it would mean that we are equal...and in our equality then I could be pardoned.’_

There was a snarl...something unearthly...beastial. Like the rumble in the chest of a bear...but louder, something that shook the peaks around them until rock tumbled from the crags...one of them missing the Noldorian’s head by a handbreadth. Light...that _unbearable_; light and those hands were of fire...those hands were digging into him like twin furnaces...like the pits of the earth boiling forth to be shoved into the depths of his very being.

_”And if **I** can be pardoned, then surely so can you.”_

Despair.

Despair and pain...a conflagration of acknowledgement and abandon. There was laughter in Maedhros’ head...echoing and snarling...roiling and yet somehow inveigling all at once. The arm from which he was hung twitched helplessly as he attempted to get away from the unbearable heat...as sweat poured from his brow.

_’Is it not so...enemy mine?’_ Crooned into his ear...like a poisoned lullaby and he was choking...choking on his own blood as the world fell to flame. When he did not respond, the question was a roar. _**’Is it not so?!’**_

“Yes!” he gasped, rubicund slithering over his lips...staining his teeth as he said it. _”Yes-!”_

-And then he was alone.

Alone over dark crags as the furnaces of Utumno glowed below him like multiple...ominous eyes. Breathing ragged, Maedhros swung his head left and right, up and down...but there was nothing there. His free hand came up-trembling-to grasp what he was sure was a hole in his chest...but there was, again, naught. His visage was unmarred...no more than it had been before in any case. He thought that he might have heard laughter...something distant and dark...disappearing downwards like a phantom...but it was snatched away with the wind.

His chest heaving, the Noldorian stared up at the sky and wished for death...wished for release from his torment even as he was sure that everything he had seen and heard was real...if only in his mind. The blackened gusts over Angband howled their triumph into the nothingness...and after a time Maedhros fell unconscious...from pain, from terror, from guilt and from hunger. And when Fingon came for him...mere hours later...he was rescued. But something in him remained among the peaks of Thangorodrim...

...Broken beyond repair.

**Author's Note:**

> *may have horrendous spelling errors and generic grammar herpderp (I've caught a few).
> 
> Some notes because I keep reading over this: 
> 
> -I do want to return to this fandom, as I have a vested (and newish) interest in Angbang and the intricacies therein. However I acknowledge that any fic I write regarding the pairing would be long (I would, feasibly, attempt to span all three ages of Arda), and I already have enough fics to finish up before I stray anywhere within this territory. I am, however, getting to the point where I'm burning out on the fandom and fandom pairing I'm currently in. I have another Tolkien-verse fic I've yet to finish, but after that, I'm probably going to be back. Knowing me, however, it's only a matter of time before I stagger back here ahead of time because I have zero self control. 
> 
> -You'll probably notice that Maedhros acknowledges what Sauron cannot, or will not; which is an affection for Sauron. Or, at the very least, an attatchment. I want to explore this as well, but I should warn that the romantic connotations for such a fic would be quite low, and overtoned by brutality. That segment regarding eating elves; I'd go there to a great degree, though I think that's probably an extreme. Most of the work I've done...so far, has happy endings. I'm looking not really for a melancholy ending, nothing regretful that shows their level of difference or the world's inability to see them. If I would do this, it would be ravenous, gluttonous ending; but not really happy. Uh. So yes. That's coming I think. 
> 
> Regardless, thank you for reading and any input is appreciated.


End file.
